Granger, O
by ncisnewbie
Summary: My contribution for #GrangerAppreciationWeek. Why is Granger always upset with Hetty? Here's their back story.


"Granger, O."

My contribution for Granger Appreciation Week. Originally planned as a chapter in my other story, "No Good Choices." You don't have to read that before you read this. (But it would be great if you read that after you read this!)

Continued gratitude for Motsie Of Atlantis

As usual, I don't own NCIS: LA

* * *

Owen Granger sat on the bed in a sterile extended-stay hotel. "This place isn't bad," he thought. "More decorated than my studio back in DC." He stared at his day planner, doodling one last time on the number 29. Seven months he'd been staring at this day, covering, covering the entry for the twenty-ninth of July. If he had his way, July would simply skip from twenty-eighth to thirtieth, but if need be, there would be a day called 'Box of July' just to keep things balanced. The day came anyhow, like it had thirty times before, and the way he marked it never changed.

He poured his Scotch, then went to the wall safe and extracted a lock-box. From the lock-box he extracted a small pile of photos. From the top photo, a smiling couple looked back at him. The man looked like a younger version of himself: close-cropped black hair, a forehead prematurely barren. The nose, that was the difference: Then it was carved, sturdy and angular, like some 1950's-era movie star; now it was bulbous and whiskey-swollen. The woman was petite and beautiful. Blazing red hair with a slender, bony frame: 160 cm high, and 48 kg of pure muscle, he remembered. The couple was framed by, of all things, a bear and its trainer. Young Owen stood next to the bear, which wore a flashy red costume and a muzzle. His love stood next to the trainer who held a motorcycle in his other hand. All the tumult of the famed Moscow Circus gamboled behind them.

The second photo showed the same woman, all in white, precisely posed en pointe, her red hair glossed and formed into an intricate swan-winged bun, topped with a feather hairpiece. A cygnet, he remembered. Swan Lake choreography that traced back ninety years. The part had been, she said, the best in her career. His finger traced along her form. "How, Marina? How could they take you away?" He rubbed her cheek; he slid his finger up along her arm, as if to offer what little support he could in that precarious pose.

* 0 *

Henrietta Lange ambled into the armory and initiated the security procedures for her wall safe. When it opened, she gathered a pile of CIA Top Secret files, and from it selected one for review. "MARINA BARZAKOVA / OWEN GRANGER, 8/27/84"

In the folder, a picture, taken with a long-focus lens, showed the happy couple sitting in the bleachers at the Moscow Circus. The photo only partially covered a yellowed, typewritten document, which Hetty extracted for review.

Report of H. LANGE 7/30/84, Chief, Station Elmer:

On 7/27, I was approached by Agent E. DAVID, Mossad, as I crossed Red Square, Moscow. We arranged to meet again in a mutually-acceptable secure location. There, Agent DAVID provided photographic evidence of a romantic entanglement between Agent O. GRANGER, also with the company, and USSR National, MARINA BARZAKOVA, 23. At the time, BARZAKOVA was a soloist with the USSR National Ballet Company, the Bolshoi Ballet. Originally from Baku, Azerbaijan SSR, she rose to prominence with the Bolshoi due both to her skill and to the sponsorship of DMITRI AGAMALI, 67,Chair, Azerbaijan People's Committee. …

* 0 *

Young Hetty stared at the photo. "In my shoes, Eli, what would you do?"

"It must be stopped, Henrietta. Your countries are at war."

"It's a cold war, but you're right. He'll be heartbroken."

"If hearts are broken, not stopped by the war, then we've succeeded at our craft."

"That doesn't mean I have to like it."

"What we do for our countries, Henrietta."

The dacha of some party bigwig. He'd been tempted to leave a bug, but that would betray Marina.

Afterward. They snuggled in the low light of Moscow's long summer evening, and talked in halting Russian. "Come with me, Marina. I've got an appointment for you with the Houston Ballet."

She covered her lovely mouth in horror. "You didn't use my name, did you? What would Dmitri say?"

"He won't find out until it's too late."

"They've got ears everywhere. Your side does, too."

"That wouldn't be an ear joke, Rini, would it?" He stretched his even further out to the side.

She giggled. "No. Love-chek, but if you want, I'll tell you about the solar eclipse they caused last week."

"All the better to hear you with, my dear," and he pressed one ear to her sternum, eliciting, at first, more giggles.

* 0 *

In a sterile, sound-proof room, Hetty and Owen glared at each other across the interview table. "You've got to stop it, Owen."

"But Houston. What a coup, for Houston to steal a star from the Bolshoi."

"At what price? This is not some collector's game, Owen. If you had gone through with it and had a hand in her defection, it would have fundamentally alter the delicate balance that is détente."

"But what, what will happen to her?"

"Sad as it might be, that is not our concern. Agamali is influential in the party. If provoked, he would stand in the way of Gorbachev's reforms."

"But he treats her like she's his property. He uses her, Hetty."

"It is the Russian way. We don't have to like it, but we must bend to it in the name of the greater good."

The tirade. He called her every name in the book. Communist, heartless, everything which rhymes with witch. Hetty stood, hands clasped behind her back, and took it all.

When he finally wore down, she summarized. "You will sleep here tonight, Owen, under guard. In the morning, you'll be escorted to a transport back to Langley. Your effects will follow after they've been inspected. Once there, you will have decisions to make. You are a talented operative, Mr. Granger, but emotion is clouding your judgment."

* 0 *

Owen Granger looked at the room-service menu in his hotel room. His mind drifted to his assignments since Moscow. Panama, where he'd sat in his steamy flat, reading, rereading Machiavelli and Sun Tzu and exegeses by their more recent disciples, from Chairman Mao to Colin Powell. Nicaragua, Jordan, Brussels… really, it was a meteoric rise. Levers he'd pulled, toes he'd stepped on, but mostly when needed. Headquarters, where he'd met Donald Blye and his team. Subtly looking after his daughter, effectively orphaned. When Eli's daughter, Ziva, joined NCIS, she'd been fortunate to stay outside his line of command, but with every other woman, he sponsored, doing his best to do penance for that one tirade in a Moscow sub-basement, that one time he'd let his guard down around that remarkable woman. First, she was his station chief; now she reported to him.

Money came, too. If the Assistant Director of a major DOD agency chose to live like a student, using his expense account for anything he could—even barely—justify, he could develop a considerable nest-egg, or, if he'd rather, considerably advance his pet project.

The next morning, the phone rang in a warehouse in a tumbledown residential neighborhood in Los Angeles. "The Marina Schoo…"

"Is Madame Edna there?" he asked without preface.

"May I tell her who's calling?" It was a young girl with an Oklahoma accent, trying to be polite.

Owen Granger's silence answered the question. He overheard the conversation, even through the hand-covered mouthpiece.

"Edna, a call for you."

"Who is it?" A severe, but upper-crust, English accent.

"He wouldn't say." He heard the door shut behind the receptionist.

"Hello, Owen, it's nice to talk to you again. "

"Hello, Edna. I wanted to check that everything is in order for the recital."

"Absolutely. You will appear on the program as Ferrer Owens, as usual."

"Anything I should review?"

"We'll be having _the Cygnets_ this year."

"That's great news! I'll be earning my keep this time. You'll have to double the stipend for your accompanist."

Madame Edna gave a laugh. "That will be a feat. You're both accompanist and principal benefactor: give yourself the raise."

"Who's performing it?"

"The fourteen-year-olds: Marcia, Qin, Sophia, and Cora. Elise is our understudy."

"How is Cora's family, now?" Granger asked.

"Much better. Her dad got a much better job and wants to pay us. He says he always pays his dues."

"You know the drill. Set Mom and Dad up for an appointment 'with the accountant,' and put a college savings enrollment form in her folder. I'll meet with them after the recital and help them set it up. Her grades?"

"Improved. The homework support and Internet access she gets here have helped."

"And Sophia? How is her home situation?"

"Improved. Mom finally moved her out. Uncle has been much better than her stepfather was."

"How is little Jen?"

"Much better. Her shoulder is improving."

"Blasted drive-by. Did they ever catch them?"

"Not that I know of."

He wrote the name in his day planner. "How are the costumes?"

"Modest even by your standards, Owen."

"You know my perspective, 'dance to develop character.' It's ballet, not cabaret."

They lapsed into rueful silence. Edna broke it. "I heard she's director of the State Ballet School in Baku, now."

"That doesn't mean it hurts any less."

"I'm sorry for bringing her up. Is there anything I can do?"

"Just keep doing what you do, Edna." His voice dwindled, nearly to a whisper. "Keep doing what you do."


End file.
